Internet editorial

Citation

McGaughey, R.E. (2002), "Internet editorial", Benchmarking: An International Journal, Vol. 9 No. 3. https://doi.org/10.1108/bij.2002.13109cag.001

Internet editorial

The editorial staff of Benchmarking: An International Journal is committed to helping those working at a senior level in industry, the public sector, consultancy, or academic institutions, to stay current on developments in the areas of quality, technology and benchmarking. The focus of the journal is on "topics that have a substantial management content, rather than being primarily technical in nature". The Internet editorials will center on sites with a similar focus. I will examine sites believed to be of interest to BIJ readers and report, in what I believe to be a fair and objective manner, what I find at those sites.

This editorial is devoted to benchmarking in human resource management ((HRM) the area we once called personnel management). Human resources (people) are arguably a critical resource in organizations. Even with the great advances in automation and IT, human resources remain critical to the success of organizations, both public and private. Efficient and effective management of human resources has the potential to profoundly influence present and future organizational success, thus one would expect benchmarking HRM performance to be commonplace. When I started conducting the research for this editorial, I anticipated finding many sites devoted to benchmarking performance in HRM, but my Web searches produced disappointing results. Many HRM focused Web sites and Web pages were found, but surprisingly few had even so much as a benchmarking or best practice link. Four sites are featured in this HRM benchmarking editorial, and only one of the four is devoted entirely to benchmarking HRM. The other three sites were not focused solely on HRM benchmarking. They were included because they do offer some value to BIJ readers with an interest in HRM benchmarking.

The searches

As in all of my Internet editorials, I provide information about searches and search engines as well as benchmarking sites. Before conducting the searches for this editorial, I sought help in identifying some new search engines for use in this editorial. I found an interesting site for that purpose. The site is Search Engine Watch (www.searchenginewatch.com). For my purposes, the most useful link at that site was the "Search Engine Listing" link. It helped me to identify many possible search engines for use. The Search Engine Listings page contained links to pages listing major search engines, news search engines (for current news on a variety of topics), search engines for kids, specialty search engines, multimedia search engines, meta search engines, search utilities, regional search engines and more. Other links one might find useful on the Search Engine Watch home page are the Reviews, Ratings and Test link, and the Search Engines Resources link. There were many other links available at the Search Engine Watch site. It is a good starting place for novices who wish to learn how to search the Web, and it is a good resource for more seasoned "Web surfers" who wish to keep abreast of what's new in search engines.

For this editorial, I conducted my searches using three search engines. Two were relatively new, Vivisimo (www.vivisimo.com) and Infonetware (www.infonetware.com), and one was an old and trusted standby, Metacrawler (www.metacrawler.com ). Initially, the following three key word phrases were used in the searches: "benchmarking human resources", "HRM benchmarking" and "human resource management benchmarking". Two other search phrases were employed after the initial searches produced disappointing results. Those phrases were as follows: "human resource management scorecard" and "best practice human resource management". While all of the searches produced many hits, few sites were found to be devoted to benchmarking HRM practice. Regardless of search engine used or the search phrase employed, there was much redundancy across hit lists, but this was expected given the redundancy in the search phrases themselves. Vivisimo and Infornetware offer something a little different from the more traditional search engines.

With Vivisimo search results are organized using a format like the windows explorer. Hits are divided into categories (like folders) that are listed in a frame on the left of the screen. A tally for hits appears next to each category. A category's hit list is displayed by left clicking the plus symbol (+) to the left of the category name (like one displays sub-folders and files in the Explorer). At this point, one need only click the desired link to visit the targeted site, or page. The first search using Vivisimo produced categories like "identify practices", "surveys", "organizational", "work environment" and "training and development" to categorize the resulting 182 hits. This method of organizing search results was useful, but Vivisimo used frames, making it difficult for one to place selected sites on one's favorites list (bookmark them in Netscape) for future reference. If one attempted to add a site to one's favorites list, it added the Vivisimo.com site rather than the targeted site or page. I simply copied the links to a word document for future reference to overcome that annoying problem. The search of Vivisimo.com produced many hits, but like all of the searches conducted for this editorial, sites devoted entirely to benchmarking HRM or HRM best practice were rare. It is noteworthy that a number of interesting books and articles did turn up on the hit lists. Some of the articles were available on-line in full text, and most of the books could be purchased on-line.

Infonetware (www.infonetware.com), like Vivisimo, is a metacrawler. Infonetware employs what is called "RealTerm" technology to conduct an Internet search. Infonetware submits a query to a traditional Internet search engine, then sorts the results into topics. One can examine the results of a search with only a few mouse clicks. Like Vivisimo, it categorizes search results, but unlike Vivisimo, Infonetware allows you to drill down by selecting subtopics for inclusion and exclusion. Drill down results in a smaller hit list containing what would ideally be sites and pages more relevant to the user. This can substantially improve the efficiency of one's search effort. For my searches, Infonetware produced approximately the same number of hits as Vivisimo. The drill down feature did allow me to narrow down the list to what seemed to be more relevant sites and pages. One drawback, when one uses the drill down feature repetitively, is that it is difficult to tell what sites one has already visited – that can be annoying. The results of the Infonetware search yielded essentially the same sites and pages found using Vivisimo, but the filtering made possible with the Infonetware drill down feature made the searches faster and easier. With Infonetware, it was possible to add sites and pages visited to one's favorites list (bookmark them) with ease. Infonetware was more convenient to use than Vivisimo, but the outcome was essentially the same for my searches – few sites of real interest.

To be sure I was not missing something because of the search engines themselves, I conducted the same searches with an old standby, the Metacrawler. The hit lists for search phrases were longer, but I found no more useful sites and pages with the Metacrawler than with the two new search engines. Vivisimo and Infonetware did not turn up many sites or pages for this editorial, but neither did the Metacrawler. In spite of my "not so successful" first experience with Infonetware, I added it to my favorites list for future use – it offers the same advantages as Vivisimo and more. I will continue in future editorials to introduce readers to different search engines. I hope this practice helps BIJ readers to locate information regarding benchmarking and related topics on the Web. Now, let us examine the featured sites. Please note that some of the sites featured in this editorial are the property of "for profit" enterprises, and that their purpose is primarily to promote and sell products. My review of those sites should not be construed as a recommendation of the goods or services of those entities.

Featured sites

The Human Resources Benchmarking Associationhttp://www.hrba.org/

The Human Resources Benchmarking Association (HRBA™) exists for the purpose of "sharing information to improve productivity, quality and cycle time among human resources professionals". HRBA™ is a member of the Benchmarking Network, Inc. The HRBA™ site, therefore, closely resembles other BNI member sites in that it:

• •

  uses the basic BNI Web page template;

• •

  offers the same basic services and benefits; and

• •

  is governed by very similar policies.

The links on the site are the same links common to all other BNI member sites. As was noted in prior editorials, the volume of diverse and well-maintained benchmarking related links included on the standard BNI member hyperlink list is impressive. Over the course of several years and writing of numerous Internet editorials, I have come to believe that any significantly large group of professionals, sharing a common interest in benchmarking some aspect of organizational performance, will be served by BNI. The BNI "cookie cutter" approach seems to have been effective, as evidenced by the relatively large size of most BNI member groups.

Membership in HRBA™ is free, but as is the case with other BNI groups, consultants and others seeking personal gain from membership are barred from membership. HRBA™ initiates studies to improve best practice in HRM. These benchmarking studies fall into two categories: consortium studies for the membership as a whole (costs are shared by the group) and company studies (sponsored by a single company to address its own interest) that can be offered to selected HRBA™ members at no charge. In the conduct of studies, HRBA™ provides support by providing/securing access to public and private databases, identifing study participants from diverse companies, and managing many aspects of data collection. In short, HRBA™ handles much of the difficult work involved in conducting benchmarking studies. A free benchmarking newsletter is available – it is available from any BNI member site. Roundtables are periodically available to members. When I visited the site, a roundtable discussion was advertised for June of 2002 in New Orleans, LA. The conferences (roundtables) are fairly pricey, but they might be worthwhile if one is afforded an opportunity to learn more about benchmarking HRM, and to do some professional networking at the same time. The HRBA - site contains little "how to" information on benchmarking HRM. The site would seem to be of greatest value to companies seeking the opportunity to participate in benchmarking studies. This was the only site found that was dedicated to HRM benchmarking.

The Economic Research Institutehttp://www.erieri.com/

ERI Economic Research Institute describes itself as "a compensation and benefits research outsource". It specializes in providing information about employee compensation, a very important concern for HR managers. ERI provides, for a fee of course, research software and reports. ERI boasts of serving over 10,000 corporate subscribers, providing them with salary research, wage comparisons and differentials, executive salary compensation survey data, research on relocation costs, benchmark analyses, and analyses of salary data. ERI provides organizations with the data they need to set salaries, wages, relocation compensation and to examine how they measure up in these key areas. ERI offers Eurozone editions of some of its software packages. Geographic and international reports are available in hardcopy. Many of the more valuable services provided by ERI are, as you might well guess, available for a fee. Subscription rates range from $389 for select reports to $2,845 for the complete package (complete consultant's series). I found one subscription available for free, but after examining the details regarding that subscription, concluded that there was little available that would be of value in benchmarking compensation. From the ERI home page, one need only select the "Subscription" link to examine the subscription packages and prices. Since I did not examine the rather pricey products offered by ERI, there is little I can say about their value in benchmarking other than to rely on what the advertisements suggested – some of the products are touted to have significant value in benchmarking.

What is available from ERI for free? On the ERI homepage there is a frame on the left side of the page that houses most of the links I will now describe. First, under "Order your subscription", you can get a free demo. The free software package appears to be the equivalent of the free subscription already mentioned. After examining the specifications for the product, I decided not to bother downloading it. Further down the page, under the heading of "Free Data", are some interesting links. The "WSJ News Release" link provides access to the ERI newsletter. When the News Release link was examined for this editorial, the feature article addressed executive compensation and reported that the salaries of top US executives dropped 4.5 per cent from 1 January 2001 to 1 January 2002. Another link, the "Executive Compensation Index", showed the index from which came the data for the news release. Next, there is a "Salary Planning Survey". The salary planning survey is a short document describing the results of survey of company intentions in areas such as salary increases, lay-offs and more. The report was short and interesting, and exemplified the type of report that can be produced by the ERI standard assessor survey methodology.

The next link under "Free Data" is called "Immigration Salaries". The Immigration Salaries page houses a form that gathers relevant information that will allow one to examine immigration wage/salary trends in a targeted area. The projections are based on data gathered in the year 2000. I got nothing for my effort with this tool, and finally determined that the only way I could get the data was by ordering a report for $18. The link proved to be a waste of time, at least for me.

The next link of interest in the "Free Data" section was the "Survey Sources" link. This proved to be the most valuable source of "free data" available on the ERI site. This link accesses a page with links to many potentially useful salary surveys. I found a long list of links to executive salary surveys for particular industries, professions, and more. Although not every link was tested, no link rot was encountered – all links tested were current. In addition to the list of links to executive salary surveys, there were links to US and Canadian salary surveys, international salary surveys, US and Canadian employee benefits surveys and more.

The Survey Sources link was without question the most useful link I found in my quest for free information that might be of value in HRM benchmarking – compensation benchmarking to be specific. One would expect that HR managers interested in benchmarking salaries and other components of employees' total compensation would be interested in the surveys available on this page. The last link that I expected to be of value under "Free Data" was the "On-line Surveys" link; however, all surveys available were available only for a fee. I chose not purchase any surveys, so I cannot comment on their format and contents.

The last section of the navigation bar, entitled "ERI", produced two additional links of interest. The first was the "Affinity" link, which accessed a page housing links to organizations with reciprocal links to ERI. Some of those links were interesting and they all worked. One of the linked organizations, Worldatwork (WWW.Worldatwork.org), is a site containing much salary data. The last link of value was the "Newsroom" link. The Newsroom page contained links to past ERI news releases, some of which were interesting. After spending several hours examining the ERI site, I came away feeling a bit disappointed. I had found less "free stuff" that would be of value in HRM benchmarking than I had hoped, but salary data were available, and links to salary data were available. Certainly compensation is an important concern in HRM, so access to many different types of compensation statistics might make a visit to the ERI site worthwhile. It is quite likely that, were I a paying customer, I could have accessed much more valuable data.

The Human Resources Learning Centerhttp://www.iplabs.com/hr/index.htm

The HRLC is one of several on-line learning centers supported by Prosci. Prosci is a leader in reengineering and change management research, and the world's largest provider of reengineering toolkits and benchmarking information. The HRLC is one of seven Prosci learning centers accessible via the Web. The learning center was selected as one of the top 100 sites for HR professionals. One must keep in mind while we tour this site that Prosci is a for-profit enterprise, therefore, as with the ERI site, much of the information available from the HRLC is available for a fee. Nevertheless, the site was one of only a handful of sites that housed a significant volume HRM benchmarking materials.

There are several links on the HRLC index page that would be interesting to visitors searching for information about benchmarking HRM. The first is the "Benchmarking" link. This link accesses a the Benchmarking page where one will find links to the Bookstore, Best Practice Updates, Benchmarking Reports, Best Practices Series, and HR Library. The Bookstore contains links to many books about benchmarking in general, as well as books on benchmarking and best practice in HRM. The books are available through various suppliers at retail prices. Book links provide access to Web sites from which the books can be ordered – they are not purchased directly from Prosci. Also available from the Bookstore are numerous reports on benchmarking HRM and other related topics. The reports are available for a fee, and most if not all (I did not examine every one) can be purchased directly from Prosci. Good summaries are available to help one evaluate the potential usefulness of the reports. Some link failures were encountered in accessing the materials available on the Bookstore page. The "Benchmarking Reports" link accesses a page listing only benchmarking reports, some of which are available from Prosci, while others are available from other organizations. All of the reports listed include short summaries and many pertain directly to benchmarking HRM. All reports are available for a fee, but one can register and receive free executive summaries of some Prosci reports. Many of the links to non-Prosci reports failed, but source information contained in the report summaries should allow one to check on availability if so desired – reports are available from Watson Wyatt Worldwide, the Hackett Group, and others. Apparently, Prosci had just completed a study of "HR innovative practices benchmarking" in 65 companies. A summary of that report was available free of charge to anyone willing to register to get it. The "Best Practice Updates" link found on the Benchmarking page accessed the same page accessed by the "Best Practice" link found on the HRLC index page. The Best Practice page contained links to current and planned tutorials concerning best practice in HRM. The tutorials themselves were rather interesting, and I found several useful links on the Tutorials page navigation bar-links I had not seen elsewhere on the HRLC pages. One of those links will allow one to sign up for free report highlights and free HR updates. Signing up for these services will get one e-mail or fax notices of the updates and/or summaries, depending on one's choice(s). Other potentially valuable links on the tutorial page navigation bar include the following:

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  an "Associations" link, accessing a page that describes and provides links to many HR related professional associations;

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  a "Conferences and Events" link to a page housing notices for many, many upcoming HRM conferences (the notices were current);

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  a "Journals and Magazines" link, accessing a page that describes the periodicals and provides links for access to Web sites or subscription to the periodicals;

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  a "HR Mailing Lists and Newsletters" link to a page describing and providing links to numerous mailing lists and newsletters offering a forum for the discussion of HRM issues, including benchmarking;

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  a "References Sites" link, accessing a page of links to the sites of organizations worldwide that would be of interest to HR managers. Many of the sites visited via this page were found to house at least some information about benchmarking in the many areas of concern in HRM.

In examining the links found on the several pages mentioned above, I encountered no link failures, suggesting that Prosci personnel are actively maintaining this part of the HRLC site. One need not visit the HRLC site expecting to find a large volume of information pertaining to benchmarking HRM practices. What one will find in visiting the HRLC site is enough information to make the visit worthwhile and, more importantly, one will find many links to sites where relevant information might be available. The many useful links found on the HRLC site were perhaps the most positive aspect of my site tour. My only real criticism of the site is the organization of links. I think that a single links page that categorizes links would be very helpful. I found the same links in different places on the HRLC site and, in some instances, the link would have a description of the target site, and in other instances the link would appear without the accompanying description. If you visit this site, be prepared to spend a good bit of time touring the site. Although the site houses many useful links, they are scattered around the site on different pages. If you are willing to spend enough time exploring the HRLC site, your patience should be rewarded by discovery of many useful links.

The Human Resource Management Self Assessment Guidehttp://www.hr.state.tx.us/apps/hrsag

I included this site in this editorial because I believe it offers a glimpse of an important tool/approach that could become common in future benchmarking initiatives, not just in HRM but in any area of importance to public and private institutions. The site is owned by the state of Texas and was created to support state agencies at all levels in the development of sound workforce plans. The HRM Self Assessment Guide (SAG) was created by the State Auditor's Office to help state agencies assess strengths and weaknesses in the management of human resources. The SAG is part of a broader effort to help Texas get the most from the billions of dollars it spends annually on human resources. Although I was unable to gain access to the guide itself, because I do not work for a Texas state agency, I did examine the demo found at the following address: http://www.hr.state.tx.us/apps/hrsag/demo.cfm

The Self Assessment Guide consists of the following four sections:

1. 1.

   "self-assessment questionnaires";

2. 2.

   "additional resources";

3. 3.

   "performance measures"; and

4. 4.

   the "glossary".

There are six self-assessment questionnaires that address recruitment and selection, training and development, compensation and benefits, employee relations, and safety health and security. I examined a "recruitment and selection sample questionnaire". The questions were posed in a multiple choice and yes/no format for easy scoring. A sample question from the "collecting relevant information and selecting final applicants" section of that questionnaire appears below to demonstrate the format used. The questionnaires are easily scored and the data from the questionnaires are easily stored and analyzed:

1. Are controls in place to ensure that employees involved in the hiring process use only standardized interview questions developed specifically for the job vacancy?a. Always (100 percent)b. Often (75-99 percent)c. Sometimes (50-74 percent)d. Seldom (25-49 percent)e. Rarely or never (less than 25 percent) or, we not develop standardized interview questions for each specific vacancy.

The hyperlinks embedded in the questionnaire help the respondent understand the terminology used on the questionnaire – they provide access to the glossary. When a questionnaire is completed, it can be submitted for scoring. I examined an example report card and found that, with the assessor, Texas agencies can be graded on performance in six areas corresponding to the questionnaire types (i.e. an agency gets a score for "compensation and benefits"). Scores range from an A (very good) to F (very poor). Below the module scoring table is a key to assist one in understanding the meaning of scores. For example, an F means "You are in real trouble. Immediate and significant improvement is needed…". A guide for analysis appears below the scores. It explains how the scores can be analyzed in different ways and how they might be used to bring about improvement.

Because I was not a registered agency, I was unable to access the "Additional Resources" included in the Self Assessment Guide. They (the Additional Resources) were described on the Web page as "a list of information sources that will be helpful in your efforts to improve performance". It sounds as though it is comprised of links to other sources of benchmarking and HRM related information. One is advised that one can use the analysis of the evaluation results in deciding what information sources would be useful. I was also unable to access the "Performance Measures" area, which apparently houses a list of basic performance measures appropriate for HRM. I did get a glimpse of the "Glossary" by following some of the hyperlinks embedded in the questionnaire. The glossary contained good, clear definitions of important HR and benchmarking terms. Back on the home page for the Texas Human Resources Agency (www.hr.state.tx.us) there were other good links. Under the "HR Topics" section there were six links pertaining to topics like "Recruitment and Selection", "Training and Development", and "Management Practices". All of the links accessed pages containing information and links to other sites containing information about the topics. I discovered some HRM benchmarking related information while examining some of those links.

There was enough benchmarking related information on the Texas HR Agency's site to make it worth visiting, but what impressed me the most was the "Self Assessor" – more so the concept of the Assessor, than the content. I gathered from the scoring done by the "Self Assessor", that performance was not directly compared to the performance of others in a database, but rather based on some predefined criteria for rating performance. I showcased a similar site in an earlier editorial where one could take advantage of the opportunity to do a free assessment, wherein one's company performance would be compared to other like companies that had used the tool, and thus contributed to the performance data stored in the database. It would seem simple enough to combine the best from these two approaches and develop a site for Web based benchmarking. Were an industry, government, company, or professional organization (human resources, quality, engineering, marketing professional associations) to take the initiative to do so, a benchmarking tool could be developed to support the present and future benchmarking efforts of constituents. A company could build such a tool for use on a corporate Intranet. A professional organization, industry group, or trade association could establish a site on the Internet to house such a tool. The two sites that I examined on the Web show that the technology is available to undertake such an endeavor. I believe that this approach to benchmarking will become more popular in the future. I felt that including the Texas site in this editorial would give BIJ readers a glimpse of what might well become an important tool for benchmarking in the future.

The focus of BIJ is on "topics that have a substantial management content, rather than being primarily technical in nature". Benchmarking human resource management is an important management topic and, thus, was the focus of this editorial. While I was surprised that there were so few sites devoted to this important topic/practice, I remain convinced that benchmarking HRM is important to practitioners and researchers. Information about the topic is scattered but is available in cyberspace and elsewhere. Perhaps, in pointing out the difficulty of finding topic related resources on the Web, this editorial will encourage the development of more sites about benchmarking (and best practice) in HRM. Maybe readers, familiar with Web based resources dedicated to benchmarking HRM, will provide location details (URL, etc.) that can be included in future editorials. As I always say, my goal is to write Internet editorials that will be valuable to BIJ readers. To accomplish this goal, I ask for the assistance of BIJ readers. If you have a site, or know of a site, that you would like to see featured in future editorials, please e-mail me your suggestions. Your input would be greatly appreciated. Send your comments and suggestions to Ronald McGaughey at ronmc@mail.uca.edu

Ronald E. McGaugheyInternet Editor